


To Ask and To Have

by Crowgirl



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Angst, First Time, Humor, M/M, Plot What Plot, Post-Hunt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-11-18
Updated: 2011-11-18
Packaged: 2017-10-26 06:29:07
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,487
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/279821
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Crowgirl/pseuds/Crowgirl
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dean. Cas. Shower.</p>
            </blockquote>





	To Ask and To Have

Sam stands back by the open door, eyeing Dean and Castiel thoughtfully. ‘You’re both gonna need new clothes.’

‘No shit, genius -- y’think?’ Dean crosses his arms and gives his brother a filthy look. The ripped-open trash bag crinkles under his feet and he wishes he hadn’t moved because that just makes the stuff smell _worse._

Sam grins at him. ‘I’ll get your bag out of the car, Dean. And Cas...’ He looks at the angel for a minute. ‘I guess I’ll have to go into town to get you something.’

‘I am sorry for the inconvenience, Sam.’ Cas sounds discomfited. ‘I do not seem able to clean this...substance.’

‘Goop, Cas, goop. That’s the technical term,’ Dean interjects.

‘Don’t listen to him.’ Sam turns around, leaving the door open, and Dean sees him vanish in the direction of the car.

He sighs, shifts position slightly, then wishes, again, that he hadn’t. Every move he makes sends new wafts of stink up his nose and at this point he really wishes his sinuses would just go numb. ‘Hey, Sammy--’

‘What?’ Sam reappears in the door.

‘Do us a favor and go salt and burn that bastard before night, okay?’ Dean gestures at himself and Castiel. ‘I don’t really want to do this again.’

‘Sure. It’ll take me a bit longer.’ Sam drops Dean’s duffel just inside the door and takes a step back out.

‘Cas? Do you care?’ Dean asks without turning around.

‘No, Dean. Do as you see best, Sam.’

Sam nods and shuts the door. After a few minutes, Dean hears the telltale sound of the Impala’s engine and then the slow receding as Sam heads out. As always, he feels a bit abandoned, a bit like the kid left out of being picked for teams -- but he shakes that off.

He and Cas have bigger problems right now. He shuffles in a small semi-circle on the trash bag until he can see the angel. Castiel is inspecting himself with the same calm curiosity he uses for everything: in this case, ghost bile.

Sam had been the lucky one, able to duck back behind a solid wooden door as the big guy let loose but Dean and Cas had gotten caught straight in the blast. And the damned ghost had the nerve to stand there and _laugh_ at the two of them. And then vanish straight back to wherever ghosts hang out between hauntings before Dean had a chance to send even a single rock-salt round through him.

Dean watches Cas try to find a dry spot somewhere on his coat or suit and tries not to think about how the liquid, foul-smelling and ugly as it is, has plastered the cheap suit down over Castiel’s legs and chest until Dean can practically make out major muscle groups.

‘So -- how do you think we do this?’

Castiel looks up at him, still holding a fold of his shirt away from his body. ‘We should strip here. If we leave our clothes on these bags, we stand the least chance of contaminating the rest of the room.’

‘Yeah...guess you’re right.’ Dean kneels down, fumbling with the laces of his boots. The laces are tangled and knotted together with the slimy shit, so he’s completely blind-sided when he finally steps out of the heavy boots, looks up, and Castiel’s half-naked, trenchcoat, suit jacket, and shirt in a sticky pile at his feet. Castiel has his shirt still in one hand and is looking at it with interest, poking at a smear on the collar. His hands are streaked and splotched with gunk and Dean can even see a patch on his throat, just below his left ear.

As he watches, Castiel rubs at the patch below his ear, scratching at it with one slim finger, then gives up, dropping his shirt in a pile at his feet. The light from the window is filtered through heavy curtains -- Sam had drawn them when he was setting up the room for Operation De-Gunk -- but it somehow still manages to touch Castiel’s skin and make it glow. There are faint shadows at his collarbone and above his hips where the trousers are just about hanging on for dear life and Dean’s throat is suddenly dry and he looks back down at his fingers, covered in brownish sticky substance.

‘Dean? Do you need assistance?’ Castiel sounds calm, normal, as if this is the sort of shit that happens to him every day. Dean has to admit, he’s right; this sort of shit has been happening more and more every damned day since the angel started hunting regularly with him and Sammy. It’s like the weird and freaky felt Castiel was a challenge and brought out the _really_ big guns.

Dean shakes his head, still staring down at his fingers, wiping them gingerly against his socks. ‘Nope. Nope, I’m fine.’ _It’s just if I get up right now, I’m going to end up explaining a lot more about human anatomy than I was really planning on this afternoon._

He groans silently to himself and tries cursing as a method to talk down his dick. It works -- mostly -- after a moment or two and he pushes himself up again. Castiel is looking at him curiously, hands on his belt, and Dean looks away quickly, fumbling out of his own overshirt and leaving it in a squishy pile on his boots.

The silence is pressing on his ears, making him entirely too conscious of not being able to look Castiel in the eye for fear of what the angel would see in his face. ‘So...this kinda sucks, huh?’

It wasn’t that Dean didn’t know guys could get him goin’ -- he’d known that since his early 20s and was, more or less, at peace with it. The problem was that he never expected to get a painful erection from hanging out and talking with Castiel in the front seat of the Impala waiting for Sam to get done with research in the East Bumfuck Historical Society three months earlier.

It wasn’t as if Cas had _done_ anything, then, either; he’d just been sitting there, telling Dean about some conversation he’d had with a waitress in a diner earlier in the day and Dean had looked over at him, seen the angle of his chin in the cold glow of the streetlight above the car, watched him turn his head to look at someone walking by on the other side of the road, and _voom,_ like fucking magic.

Since then Dean’s life felt like a sick version of Monopoly: look at the angel, do not pass go, do not collect two hundred dollars, go straight to aroused. Distracting isn’t exactly the word Dean uses for it anymore. It’s more like fucking nightmarish.

‘Dean?’

Dean’s head snaps up and Cas is still looking at him, shirtless, entirely too close while managing to be about four feet away. ‘Uh -- yeah?’ He busies himself tugging his t-shirt out of his jeans and over his head.

‘Are you all right?’

‘Yeah, yeah, I’m fine...’ Dean mumbles, dropping his t-shirt on the growing stack of ruined clothing and fumbling at his belt buckle, conscientiously concentrating on what his fingers are doing and ignoring, absolutely _ignoring_ the rustle of cloth a few feet away that means Cas is stepping out of his trousers.

Dean’s belt buckle is remarkably obstinate, requiring full concentration: look at that, it’s almost entirely free of ghost goop so if he just slides it free of the belt loops _very_ carefully then he might be able to salvage it. Loop after loop after loop -- and he tosses the length of leather onto the nearest bed.

His jeans fall loose around his hips and he manages to step out of them without undoing more than the top button and blesses the loose boxers he actually thought to wear this morning. He yanks the socks off each foot with the toes of the other foot and then, gritting his teeth, looks up.

Castiel is still standing there, hands crossed loosely in front of his hips. Dean can just see the faint shadow of a line of hair on his lower abdomen, leading down into his boxers and feels his blood leap downwards. He curses silently, shifting position slightly and trying not to _look_ as though he is shielding his groin with his hands. ‘What’cha waitin’ for, Cas?’

‘I am not sure what we are supposed to do next,’ the angel offers diffidently.

‘Uh -- shower?’

‘I have never used one.’

 _Oh, fucking great._ ‘Through there.’ Dean points to the bathroom door in the back of the room and wrenches his eyes up to the ceiling as Castiel turns away, thinking rather desperately that there must be a special place in Hell for those who stare at the asses of angels.

Castiel pads silently across to the faded brown door and Dean sees the light flash on and hears the grate of the plastic door on the shower cubicle being pushed aside. He stays where he is for a long moment, staring up at the ceiling, counting spiderwebs or cracks in the tile or possibly praying, he’s really not sure.

He steps gingerly off the rubbish bag and starts kicking his duffel bag towards the bathroom. He’s got too much goop on his hands and arms from his clothes to want to risk touching it.

‘Dean?’

‘Comin’.’ He leaves his bag just outside the door and goes inside.

Castiel is peering into the shower compartment with the air of someone trying to work out how to run the space shuttle.

‘Just twist that handle -- there, _there,_ Cas, jeeze...don’t they teach you anything in Heaven?’

Castiel reaches in and turns the control and water showers down, pattering against the hard plastic of the door and the scuffed tub. He turns to Dean. ‘Showering was not among my studies.’

‘No course on “Elementary Passing for Human”?’ Dean turns to check himself out in the mirror, groaning a little as he sees the gunk plastered over his hair. It’s stopped smelling as it dries which is one good thing.

‘No. I watched many humans over time, of course, and I thought this would be...simpler than it is.’

‘Doesn’t every one.’ Dean turns back, leaning against the sink. ‘Well, go on. This place doesn’t have all the hot water in the world.’

Castiel tilts his head. ‘Do you not want a shower as well?’

‘Uh, yeah? That’s why I’m telling you to get the hell on with it?’ Dean reaches over and yanks the bathroom door shut; it isn’t like it’s July out there or anything and he’s starting to feel the chill.

Castiel is still looking at him, head on one side, and his eyebrows are drawn together like he’s confused or wants to ask another question and Dean jerks a hand at him.

‘C’mon, man. I’m not gettin’ any younger here!’

The corners of Castiel’s mouth twitch downwards and he turns away, showing Dean the curve of his pale back as he shuffles his boxers downwards. Dean bites the inside of his cheek hard because that is _not_ making things any better.

Trying to hurry the process along, he takes a step forward and yanks back the shower door, giving Castiel room to step past him and into the spray of water.

Instead, Castiel shoots him a look that can only be described as ‘hunted’ and damn near _cringes_ back out of his way.

‘I didn’t mean to--’ Dean starts when he realises what the problem is.

Castiel seems to realise he realises at the same moment and straightens up with a sigh, letting his hands fall at his sides. ‘I am sorry, Dean.’

‘Uh -- I --’ Dean blinks, resisting the urge to smack himself in the face to check if he’s dreaming and drags his eyes up Castiel’s body, away from his half-hard cock between narrow, pale thighs. ‘Uh -- what? What?’

Castiel gestures down at himself, shoulders slumping. ‘I realise this is...an unfortunate thing between humans who are not lovers. If I could stop it, I would but this body seems to have a mind of its own.’

‘Oh...uh...well...I...yeah.. it...it happens, man, don’t...uh...yeah, don’t sweat it.’ Dean is amazed that the words coming out of his mouth make any sort of sense because he can’t feel his lips right now.

Castiel shrugs, rubbing at one temple. ‘I have tried to find out what I should do about it.’

‘Oh...uh...’ _Fuck fuck fuck_ because that just calls to mind all sorts of images of Cas with porn and Cas with toys and oh _fuck._

‘It only happens around you.’

‘I...’ And the words simply shut off and Dean can’t think of a damned _thing_ to say. He stares at Cas and has to reach up to check that his mouth is actually shut and he’s not drooling like a horny teenager. Castiel isn’t looking at him; instead, he’s got his eyes fixed past Dean’s shoulder, apparently studying some pattern in the droplets of mist coming out of the shower head.

Cas _can’t_ have said what he just thought he said. He’s clearly not tuned in right now so Cas obviously didn’t say what he heard. Or he meant something else.

‘I am...sorry. For this. I did not -- I know it is embarrassing -- for humans -- I did not mean to embarrass you.’ Castiel looks more than embarrassed; he looks fucking _humiliated_ and that’s not a look Dean thinks he likes. It makes the corners of Castiel’s mouth pull down and in and his eyes dark and unhappy. ‘I will...I will wait until you have cleaned yourself.’

‘Don’t be an idiot,’ Dean says, more harshly than he means to, and catches Castiel’s arm, tugging him forward and pushing him into the shower.

‘But -- Dean -- I cannot -- this body--’

‘Let me worry about it, okay?’

‘I...all right...’ Cautiously, carefully, Castiel climbs into the shower and stands under the warm spray of water. Not bothering to undress the rest of the way, Dean steps in after him and pulls the sliding door shut. The water isn’t as hot as he’d like, but it’s okay, warm enough to take away the last of the chill of the early spring afternoon. And the ghost gunk seems to be dissolving and sliding away almost of its own accord which is way better luck than he thought he deserved on the whole.

Castiel is standing with his back to Dean, shoulders slightly hunched, almost as if he expects Dean to reach out and whack him upside the head.

‘Hey, Cas...relax, man, it’s okay.’ Dean resists the urge to reach out and touch his shoulder.

‘I tried to make it go away.’ Castiel sounds miserable and he doesn’t turn around. ‘I thought...I tried...but Jimmy does not talk to me any more and Sam laughed at me.’

‘Sam -- wait a minute --’ Dean pulls Cas around. ‘You told _Sam_ about this?’

‘I could not ask you.’ Castiel doesn’t meet his eyes, stares down at their wet feet, the water pooling and swirling warm around their toes.

‘What the hell did you tell him?’

‘I asked him what one did when...when...’ Castiel gestures wordlessly at the blushing cock still bobbing half-hard at his hip. ‘And he--’

‘He _laughed_ at you?’

‘He seemed to think it was quite funny. When he stopped laughing, he did make some suggestions but none of them seemed...seemed to work for very long.’

‘Uh...well...uh...no. They don’t. You mostly...er...have to...repeat...stuff.’ Oh, Christ, he is bad at this. And his boxers are starting to soak through and stick to his skin and it’s going to become apparent to Cas _really_ quickly that he isn’t the only one in the shower with a problem. ‘Here -- just -- turn around --’ Dean guides him to stand under the strongest part of the stream of water, his back to Dean. ‘And get some of this crap off you. Don’t worry about it.’ Before he can think, Dean runs his hands quickly over Castiel’s head, slicking the last of the brown crap out of the short dark strands. That’s a _bad_ idea: Cas’ hair is soft and tangles around his fingers under the stream of water. He pulls his hands back as carefully as he can, not wanting to make the tangles worse than they have to be.

Castiel stands silent under the warm water for a few minutes then, almost too quiet for Dean to hear as he starts the unequal struggle with the wet folds of his boxers, says, ‘It only happens with you.’

‘You--what?’ Dean freezes, one foot out of the boxers, the other still tangled in elastic and cheap cotton. His hair is starting to drip a mix of water and ghost goop into his eyes and he slicks it back with the back of an arm. See, there’s that thing he thought Cas said before that he was sure he hadn’t heard right.

‘Sometimes if I am near you or -- or I think of you when I do not mean to -- or -- I do not understand it.’

‘Do you...you think about me?’

Castiel’s shoulders sag. ‘I do not seem to be able to help it.’

 _Ooooh-kay._ Dean finishes kicking his left foot out of the tangle of cloth and stands staring down at the colored mess at his feet. ‘I...uh...I don’t...I uh...don’t mind, Cas.’ Hell, if Cas chose this moment to turn back around, he’d be able to tell precisely how little Dean minded.

But Castiel’s shoulders slump further.

‘Now what?’ Dean has to ask.

‘I do not understand why it happens. I wish...I wish I could make it stop.’

‘Oh, it’s not that bad -- am -- am I really that awful?’ And that sounds pathetic, but it’s too late now.

‘No!’ Castiel glares back at him over one shoulder, water dripping off his eyebrows. ‘But I do not understand what is happening. And I cannot make it stop!’

Dean stares at him for a minute, at the water runnelling down his cheeks and off the curves of his ears and the bruise beginning to darken the muscle below his left shoulder where the wooden door hit him when the ghost barrelled through it. He reaches out without thinking and Cas _cringes_ again. ‘Okay, hey, calm down -- I’m not gonna hurt you. I’m not mad; you haven’t done anything, Cas, take a freakin’ breath.’

Stubbornly ignoring the small voice in the back of his head that’s practically doing a Leno monologue on what a totally _shit_ idea this is, Dean reaches out and touches Castiel’s hip, curves his fingers over it, feels the solidity of bone and muscle underneath his hand. He glances up and Castiel’s eyes are wide, the pupils expanding enough almost to swallow the color. ‘Cas, you gotta breathe, man.’

‘What...what are you doing?’ And now that gravelly voice, always so sure of itself, sounds completely lost and Dean wants to fall on his knees right there.

Castiel’s fingers brush against his for a moment. ‘Dean?’

‘Just...go with me, okay?’

The tip of Castiel’s tongue darts out, licks at the water beading on his lower lip, and he nods.

‘’Kay.’ And still resolutely ignoring that voice in the back of his head, Dean kneels down slowly, the ceramic of the tub still cool against his knees. He hears Castiel take a breath as if to protest or ask a question; eager to forestall anything like a discussion of why and wherefore he is doing what he’s doing, he leans forward and licks the tip of Castiel’s cock.

The breath Dean just heard him take in goes out in a whoosh and suddenly Dean can feel long-fingered hands on his shoulders, clinging to him.

Dean closes his eyes to keep the mix of water and ghost goop dripping off his hair from getting in them and tastes Cas again.

It’s been awhile since he’s done this and he has no idea if his former knack for blow jobs has stayed with him over the years. But Castiel tastes kinda good: wet, obviously, and a little like sweat, but also of something tangy that Dean thinks he could get a taste for.

But that’s not the point of this, really; indulging Dean is not the plan here, despite the fact that he can feel his own hard-on uncomfortably clearly against his thighs and nothing about this is making that better.

He leans forward again, slicking his tongue over the warm, slightly swollen head of Cas’ cock. Somewhere above him, he hears Cas make a choked, incoherent noise and a hand clutches at his hair.

‘Good or bad, Cas?’ Dean asks, pulling back momentarily and slicking his hair out of his eyes with the back of one hand.

‘Wh...what?’

Dean squints up against the spray of water and sees Cas looking down at him, expression dazed, eyes unfocussed and dark.

‘Good or bad? I don’t want to hurt you, dude!’

‘I...I...good...it is very...very good. But...Dean, I---’

Before Cas can finish whatever protest Dean is sure he’s working up, Dean leans forward again, raising up slightly on his knees to accommodate the increasing curve of Castiel’s erection, and does his damnedest to swallow Cas to the root. Above him, he hears something he thinks might be profanity in some other language, but he’s really too busy relearning how to breathe through his nose to think about it a lot.

Castiel is bigger in his mouth than he anticipated and he has to take a minute to get used to the feeling. The head of Castiel’s cock against the back of his palate nearly makes him cough until he remembers the trick of inhaling and not really bothering to swallow, letting saliva and the precome leaking from Cas mix in his mouth.

Given the noises Cas is making somewhere above him, he’s guessing this isn’t going to take too long -- and that’s kind of a shame, because he’s just starting to get into this. Cas tastes kind of sweet the more aroused he gets and the firmness of his cock against Dean’s tongue is making his own dick ache. Castiel’s hands are in his hair again, rubbing over the back of his neck and his shoulders like Cas can’t figure out what to do with them but wants to do _something._

Blindly, Dean fumbles and grabs one of Castiel’s wandering hands, interlacing their fingers, giving Castiel something to hold onto. Castiel clutches at him, almost painfully tight, and there’s something in that other language again and Castiel’s hips are jerking suddenly, a cue for Dean to move if he doesn’t want a mouthful.

But Cas tastes kinda good when he comes, a sweet salty mix that Dean has to pull back from a little regretfully, letting water run into his mouth so he can swallow easier.

He leans forward on his knees, resting his forehead against Castiel’s thigh, eyes closed, biting his lip hard in an attempt to keep himself from simply splaying out on the bathroom floor and inviting Cas to go to it if he wants.

But that wasn’t the point of this -- he’s not really sure what the point of this was except the temptation was there and Cas didn’t stop him so what the hell.

‘Dean?’

He grits his teeth. ‘Yeah.’

‘Why did you do that?’

‘Didn’t it feel good?’

‘Yes.’ Castiel pauses, Dean hears him take a breath. ‘But -- I did not expect you to--’

‘Yeah, well, don’t expect it from everyone.’ He grimaces. That’s not a nice thought: Castiel slumming around the bar scene, looking to pick up some cute twink.

Suddenly there are hands on Dean’s shoulders, urging him to his feet and Cas -- Cas who was barely functional ten seconds ago, and bright red with embarrassment ten minutes before that, is pulling him to his feet and pressing him, with startling intensity, back against the wall of the shower which is really _fucking_ cold.

‘Cas! The hell!’ Dean arches away from the damp, sticky wall which has the dual effects of getting the smallest possible portion of his skin in touch with the cold tile and of pressing him hip to chest against Cas. ‘ _Fuck..._ ’

Castiel is warm and wet and solid and Dean’s cock is enjoying all of those things whether or not Dean’s brain wants to come along for the ride. Before he can think or stop himself, his hands are around Castiel’s upper arms, palms tight against muscle, holding the smaller man in place. ‘Cas... _fuck_...I...’ He blinks his eyes open, forces them to focus, then realises that Castiel is practically _grinning_ at him. ‘What?’

‘I would not want that from everyone, Dean.’

‘I...what?’ Dean grits his teeth and does the single most difficult thing he’s done for days: he pulls back from Castiel’s thigh and makes himself stand still. It isn’t easy; in fact, he thinks he may have drawn blood from his lip. His stomach muscles are taut, his ears are singing slightly, and his hips want to jerk forward and _rub_ on something, preferably the nice firm muscle of Castiel's thigh.

‘Sam’s idea was good.’ Castiel leans forward and Dean jerks away again, thumping the back of his head painfully.

‘Whoa! What! Sam -- Sam’s _what?_ Since when did -- I -- oh, fuck the both of you -- this is a fucking _set-up?’_ Dean can’t figure out if he’s more furious or more amused: part of him wants to start laughing hysterically; part of him wants to find his brother and pound him to a jelly; part of him wants to drop to his knees again and see what Cas’ recovery time is like; and part of him just really wants to get back to the rubbing idea.

‘Not a bad one -- not ill-intentioned. I did not know you would react like _that._ I -- wanted -- I --’ Castiel stammers himself into silence, blushing like it’s going out of style; Dean is surprised the water rolling off him isn’t hotter.

 _Oh, what the hell..._ Dean reaches out and brushes his fingertips over Castiel’s cheek, tracing the line of his jaw, feeling the brush of water-softened stubble against his skin. ‘Fuck, Cas. You didn’t...you could’ve just asked.’

‘I...could?’ Castiel looks up at him again, water dripping off his eyelashes, eyes dark blue again.

Dean nods, feeling cheap and easy and strangely relieved all at once. ‘Yeah.’

Castiel studies his face for a minute, expression unreadably blank and, just as Dean is starting to feel more than a little uneasy, Castiel pushes up against him, shoulder to knee, cupping Dean’s hand against his cheek and Dean gasps at the unexpected pressure. ‘Then I am asking, Dean.’

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to [elizajane](http://archiveofourown.org/users/elizajane) for the beta and [minerva holmes](http://archiveofourown.org/users/minerva_holmes) for the general encouragement.
> 
> There is an outtake/prequel scene here: _[Coffee and Cherries](http://archiveofourown.org/works/279871)_.


End file.
